Accepting death is something we must all come to eventually. Life forces us to that understanding by giving us death, be it of pet or person. When death occurs the affected people must grieve, and it makes no difference if the being who has left us is human or animal, the extent of our grief matches the extent of our love. It is particularly difficult when the death is sudden and unexpected, and especially when the being is very young. George was two and a half, around ten for a cat's life expectancy. The seven emotional stages of grief are usually understood to be shock or disbelief, denial, bargaining, guilt, anger, depression, and acceptance/hope. They don't necessarily happen in that order and not everyone experiences all these stages depending on their philosophy and spiritual experience, or they may experience them only briefly, but the final stage, the stage where peace can be found, is acceptance. It is this state that we must come to at some point if we're to move on … [Read more...]